Heres a better idea of what we thought could possibly work and why.

The track starts at the highest point of the hill very close to a junction that could be altered into transport drop off & turn around area. Then it will need to descend into the stump riddled left overs in a variety zigzags to get more length out of the steep ridge.
We thought it could turn off into native bush and zigzag through a bit and come back out onto the flatter end of the ridge to meet with middle road. Then it would be across the stream and develop a line through the base of the pine forest into a flattish ridge of Native and then make a line down the riverbed. Where this line finishes is about 50m away from the shuttle road heading up the hill and has a large flat area for a turn and around pick up point.

From our point of view this line will create a course that will have the greatest ranges of diversity that Wellington has ever seen.

Because the middle road runs so close to the Dh line it would make it easier for spectators and emergency vehicle to gain access to a greater length of track more easily.

By using a large section of deforested ridge we would be able to cut down on the amount of construction time .

It should be noted that near the bottom of middle road new the end of our proposed line there is a massive slip that will prevent Vehicle access.

Remember this is just the ideas we came up with because we can’t make it next Sunday.
We expect there could be quite a few changes once more people get out there and look at the place allot more closely.

Awesome stuff guys - I've got software on my laptop that allows you to draw in trails on maps and will then do altitude graphs, lengths etc.

I think you're on the right track (hur hur) about the track however I'm concerned that the current setup would mean the "freeride" and the "flow" trails would most likely have to cross the downhill track (or vice versa.)

From our experiences with Long Gully intersections I think we have to be very careful with trails crossing or merging. Of course it would be possible to build underpasses/ overpasses/ whatever but this would use up resources.

From the looks of things the "Dense Native Bush" is in a steep valley - I would be interested in the possibilities of switching it back and forth across the valley so we don't lose altitude too quickly. I realize that does make extra problems of building in natives without upsetting DoC but it does leave the East side more open for "flow" and "freeride"

[edit]My post is in response to your 2:30pm post Mike [/edit] - I'll just have a look at your new post.

Tama wrote: Awesome stuff guys - I've got software on my laptop that allows you to draw in trails on maps and will then do altitude graphs, lengths etc.

I think you're on the right track (hur hur) about the track however I'm concerned that the current setup would mean the "freeride" and the "flow" trails would most likely have to cross the downhill track (or vice versa.)

From our experiences with Long Gully intersections I think we have to be very careful with trails crossing or merging. Of course it would be possible to build underpasses/ overpasses/ whatever but this would use up resources.

From the looks of things the "Dense Native Bush" is in a steep valley - I would be interested in the possibilities of switching it back and forth across the valley so we don't lose altitude too quickly. I realize that does make extra problems of building in natives without upsetting DoC but it does leave the East side more open for "flow" and "freeride"

Yea , im going to revise the plan view to limit our line to one ridge .

Their is heaps of potential in the west side only its all dense native bush and it could prove difficult with time restrictions.

Maybe at some point we need to concider the best dh line might not be built in time and work out a way of temporarly joining several sections of different proposed track.

the start of what we have come up with could maybe endup being freeride or sifter.
As the bottom could be the finish of another maybe.

Mike_the_Hippy wrote:Maybe at some point we need to concider the best dh line might not be built in time and work out a way of temporarly joining several sections of different proposed track.

the start of what we have come up with could maybe endup being freeride or sifter.
As the bottom could be the finish of another maybe.

Very good call

I like the idea of the tracks inhabitting their own areas but being close enough to mix and match for events. There could always be "link" trails between them at tactical points to allow that sort of carry on.

I think when you get up there and take a closer look you will get a better feel for how steep the sides of the ridges get and how much more easily traversing on a ridge will be opposed to traversing a gully.check it out an see what you think.

One of the first things i noticed was that your 3d map had a few extra contours that i couldnt see up close. mainly those smaller bumps everywhere. Might be where it gets confussed with the roads.

I was playing around with the mapping software and a track like this is very close to 2 kilometres long. Looking around on the web the average speed at World Cup's seems to be 30-35 kph. With that in mind 2km = 4 minutes, which would be really really good. For reference Fort William is around 2.4km long.

Please note that the track shown is purely theoretical as I haven't got a good mental picture of the terrain of the hillside. I'm just using it to show length of track.

What sort of timeline are you thinking you ahve to build to Mike.
Any Nationals Track would be for the the 2008 season, which would leave about 1 year from now minimum. I say 1 year, and thats with leaving 6 months extra on the end giving time for a pre race and then alteration if need be.
Given that any proposal will most likely take a few montshh to be put thru, still leaving around 9 months to build. Interest in building a national track will be high, as it always is (well at least for a DH track it is, not for a XC track *mutter mutter*)

...and given that if you get 20 people on a dig day, you might be able to cut out 100m of track if they all work hard...with about 10 at the last jawbone day we managed about another 30m.

...that day up at makara peak with the NEC guys - there was about 50 people, and we managed 300-ish meters, and everyone seemed to think that it was a completely epic effort...

Again, without seeing the terrain, it's hard to say how long any effort is going to take.

Im working from my expieriance in long gully and the time its taken to get as far as we have on jawbone.

I think its fare to say my interest in track development has occoured recently and could benifit from some more expieranced individuals input.

But i also think its not such a bad idea to have a skeptic to confront possible problems before they occour and have them solved as a group.
So i guess its your job to prove me wrong. your doing well so far


For the most part ive found groms are good for two hours and then loose interest.

The amount of crap weather this year has easily halved our dig days.

The location could prove a little more difficult to get mass amounts of people on a regular basis.

I realise the detailing on this track will be significantly less so it should get done quicker than long gully.


100m average cleared each dig day.
2000+m track to clear

2000/100 = 20 dig days required in one year

that works out to be about every second weekend.

Not trying to put people off just trying confront what i think are logistics issues that need some thought.

Jono wrote:
...that day up at makara peak with the NEC guys - there was about 50 people, and we managed 300-ish meters, and everyone seemed to think that it was a completely epic effort...

Epic in terms of amount of people at a dgi day - MP averages 10 people per dig day.

My Deliverance Experience (which is nasty terrain) - 1 person * 1 hour = 1 metre of finished track.

However - the best angle for this area is to use diggers where we can. Otherwise it will take years to build one track.

Tama wrote: My Deliverance Experience (which is nasty terrain) - 1 person * 1 hour = 1 metre of finished track.

However - the best angle for this area is to use diggers where we can. Otherwise it will take years to build one track.

From what ive seen, digging in some of the deforested areas will get good milage from man hours.

I think dozers have to work down the hill so it would make good sense to start them at the top making a section clear of tree stumps.

As for thick native , we will definatly need to a have a team of chain saws.

For those of you keeping an eye on the thread but not involved - we had a very successful meeting last night where we got to listen to Slackboy rave about stuff.